Marblehead Museum’s annual Garden Party in August provides a moment for ‘Headers to don casual “Marblehead Greens,” pink or reddish chinos, fancy hats and nautical wear for an evening enjoying one another’s company in Jeremiah Lee’s backyard.

For many, it’s a fun, festive highlight of the summer season before hunkering down for fall.

This year museum staff took the annual tradition, held Aug. 7, a step further, incorporating a “Marblehead Handprints” theme and seizing an opportunity to showcase what the museum called an “outstanding new addition to the museum collection.”

A sample of that new addition, an early 1970s handprint collection donated by Marblehead Handprints’ co-founders Kathy Walters and Molly Haley, was showcased under a large tent in the Lee Mansion’s garden.

The donation comes as Walters and Haley collaborate with Marblehead Museum’s Karen MacInnis to record Marblehead Handprints’ 30-year history in Marblehead, according to Pam Peterson, executive director of the museum.

The company, founded in 1971 in Marblehead, rose to the upper echelons of preppy fashion through its line of hand-printed and sewn canvas bags, dresses and handkerchiefs. The prints, with their color scheme and ships, signature handprints, crabs, lobsters and fish, scream New England fashion.

They are as much a piece of clothing as a celebration of nautical history, one person remarked during the Garden Party.

Arnould Gallery occupies the building on Washington Street in which Marblehead Handprints operated locally until 1992.

Petersen said Jack Attridge, the museum’s board president, conceived of the break from the tradition theme, which helped draw “double the number of people than a typical year,” about 250, Peterson said.

During the event, the band Melody Makers entertained guests with their folksy music.

Gene Arnould and Attridge presided over a raffle and a lively auction.

People in attendance examined over the collection while enjoying plenty of hors d’oeuvres and drinks supplied through a cash bar.